


Sing a Black Lullaby

by eggsinsunnyside



Series: Circle of Imagination [3]
Category: Bendy and the Ink Machine
Genre: Magic, Sammy sings and thats his magic, Witchcraft, Witches, mild violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-14
Updated: 2018-05-14
Packaged: 2019-05-06 22:09:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14657223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eggsinsunnyside/pseuds/eggsinsunnyside
Summary: Sammy was called to watch over a certain Witch and things escalate pretty quickly from there.





	Sing a Black Lullaby

When Sammy had been called by the High Witch, to say that he was confused would be an understatement.

He had no idea why he was being called out – someone in his coven must’ve pinned some stupid mistake on him – but it wasn’t like you could refuse the call of the High Witch. It would be the equivalent of declining a king’s offer for no good reason.

The room was covered in all sorts of symbols and circles. Sammy identifies them as defensive wards, but there’s too many for him to count.

Sammy felt the confusion growing in his mind the more he stared at the various symbols – who needed this many wards in one place?

The confusion grew by tenfold the moment his eyes landed on a very unconscious Henry Ross lying on a shoddy bed. His limbs were tied down by rope which arised some concerns out of Sammy – how long had those ropes been on him – when he noticed the High Witch sitting beside the bed.

“Mr Lawrence.” The High Witch greeted with a stoic tone, a small nod towards Sammy as acknowledge of his existence.

“High Witch,” Sammy bowed in respect, “I was told you wanted my presence?”

“Yes, I indeed called for an Old Song Witch.” The High Witch nodded which caused Sammy to frown slightly, “If I recall correctly, your coven specializes in utilizing ‘songs’ to influence magic.”

“That… Is indeed what we do.” Sammy affirmed, “Sir, I don’t mean to disrespect you but why was I called here? And why is Henry here?”

“So you know the boy?” The High Witch’s brow rose slightly at the revelation.

Sammy shook his head, “Only met him during the Witches’ Gathering. He seemed like an alright kid.”

“Then it’s much simpler explaining this situation then,” The High Witch sighed wearily and pulled up Henry’s right sleeve. He lifted the slack limb up, enough for Sammy to catch a glimpse of a symbol etched on the skin.

Sammy’s breath hitched in his throat. “A blood witch?”

“Indeed.” The High Witch confirmed, “One of the senior witches discovered the mark on him while attempting to return him to his assumed coven.”

“But he said that this was his first time at the Witches’ Gathering.” Sammy balked, frown deepening.

“His mother and father have confirmed this too.” The High Witch added with a grim look, “Which makes this situation very concerning. Either Henry discovered an unfound spell book of blood magic, or he came in contact with another blood witch who passed on their knowledge to him. I sincerely hope it is the former rather than the latter.”

Sammy could understand the reasoning behind the hope. Bad enough to have a book about blood magic lying around, you could burn that at least, but dealing with a blood witch who was likely matured by now was a completely different story.  

“So what’s happening with Henry?” Sammy asked, glancing down at Henry.

The High Witch gestured to the bed across Henry, where a woman slept. How Sammy missed that on his way inside, he had no idea.

“Abigail has sent the boy to a hypnotized induced slumber. She had been looking at his memories through his dreams in order to locate the source of the blood magic.” The High Witch explained, “I believe she’s still sifting through them as we speak.”

“If she’s doing that, then why call another Old Song Witch?” Sammy pressed, folding his arms. “Abigail’s the best in our coven. Surely she can handle Henry.”

“Though I have complete faith that Abigail will succeed in her endeavor, we are engaging with a boy who had participated in blood magic along with an unknown blood witch. We cannot be too certain that the unknown witch has done something to the boy, either alter his being or prevent us from locating the source.” The High Witch elaborated, rubbing his temples.

“The reason I’ve called you here is to solve any problems that may arise when he wakes and send him back to sleep when Abigail instructs you to.” There was a strange look in the High Witch’s eyes as he gazed at Sammy.

“You are held in high regards within your coven. Second best to Abigail, some even said.” The High Witch continued, “I trust you understand what I’m asking of you?”

Oh yeah, Sammy got the message loud and clear.

“Yes, sir.”

“I bid you luck, Mr Lawrence.” The High Witch smiled at Sammy, lifting out of his chair and practically glided out of the room.

Sammy Lawrence released the breath that he did not realize he was holding onto at first and stared down at Henry, who remained blissfully unaware of what had transpired.

Not long until after the High Witch left the room, Henry screamed.

He screamed as loud as the woman who outed him on the day of the Witches’ Gathering, far louder than what Sammy anticipated and positively tearing apart his vocal chords.

Something else was screaming too, hissing and lashing out with hate and spite fueling its rage. It was coming from Henry, Sammy idly noted as he watched Henry struggle against the rope holding him down.

Abigail was gasping, greedily sucking in gulps of air as her eyes snapped wide open, unseeing at first. Her tongue tries to form the words she needs so dearly, but whatever had shaken her messed with her mind. It won’t let her speak.

Sammy could feel his mind being fed the adrenaline, pieces of thoughts stringing together to make familiar lines of words that are all too ready to be said out loud. Despite the howling and shrieking that Henry makes, Sammy can hear the gentle thrum of _music_ in his ear, urging at him to sing and calm the black storm that was Henry Ross.

Years of practice controls Sammy’s nerves and it’s the only thing that’s keeping him singing, or else he would’ve bolted from the room immediately once he heard the ropes starting to snap ominously and watch black leak from Henry’s raw wrists.

It wrapped around him like a blanket, coating every inch of his body with the black miasma, and Sammy is absolutely positive that whatever is standing before him is not the Henry he met back at the Witches’ Gathering.

Sammy quietly hums out the notes of the Old Song, tap his feet against the floor rhythmically to keep his pace – don’t go too fast or too slow or else the magic will lose its song – and the air _shifts_ around them.

Abigail ceases to choke on the air and Henry’s scream slowly gets quieter. Instead, Henry is staring at Sammy with cold red eyes that the Old Song witch positively knew didn’t belong to Henry.

Sammy remembered Henry having warm grey eyes that sparkled with life, not this red that screamed of madness and dementia.

The ropes were long gone, lying on the floor uselessly in tatters and Henry leaps off the bed, arms stretched out to grab for Sammy’s throat. Sammy ducks immediately but he doesn’t stop singing the notes, watching as Henry flies over him and crashes against the wall.

At some point, Abigail had recovered and was quick to join Sammy in his song. A duet of the Old Song and its effects were only amplified more.

The black miasma began to disperse, slowly relieving Henry of its presence. Henry snarled and hissed, struggling to remain standing as the Old Song robbed him of more of his foreign strength.

By the time Sammy had gotten past the verse, Henry was lying on the floor, letting out a snarl that was rapidly weakening.

In his last act of defiance, Henry forced his body to heave off the ground and tackle Sammy.

 

**“S̴͎̖̱̉͐e̴̻̪̣̦͉̓̒͝ͅe̴̛̦̪͂͝ḱ̵͓̑̃ ̶̖̳̎̅̃́t̴̳̩̲̮̖̀ͅh̸̡͎̃͘ȩ̶̯̘̐̔ ̷̢̦̖͔̓̌̌̏͠͠Ļ̵̧̛̫̭̝̲i̶̻͆̀̋̽̂a̷̪͖̯̺̿͗͛̊̿͘r̷̝̳͖͐̈́̍͆͑”**

 

What the-

But the Old Song had done its job though and by the time Henry’s body collided with Sammy’s, the boy’s eyes slid shut and the black was completely gone, leaving behind an unconscious boy lying on top of Sammy.

Sammy swiftly shoved Henry off his chest. His heart was beating far too loudly for his liking and he was still trying to reel his mind back from the Old Song – the feeling that the Old Song always attempted him with addiction – when Abigail finally decided to speak.

“That. That was no ordinary blood magic.” She panted, sweat beading her forehead.

“Yeah no shit, Abigail, what do you think?!”  Sammy couldn’t help but swear loudly.

It wasn’t every day that a boy younger than you decided to exude smoke and pounced on your face when your singing made it pass out.

“Get up and put him back on the bed.” Abigail instructed with her no-nonsense tone.

“How about you let me have a breather after he jumped me?” Sammy retorted harshly despite Abigail glaring at him.

“Do you want him to pounce you again?”

Sammy grumbled out a ‘No’ and begrudgingly lifted Henry’s body back to his original bed. The Old Song witch definitely had a lower opinion of Henry now, earlier niceness be damned.

“What the hell happened in there, Abigail?”

“I don’t know yet.” Abigail shook her head, rubbing her temple. “I was looking through his memories and I thought nothing was wrong at first, but then I realized everything was wrong.”

“That makes no sense at all.” Sammy deadpanned at the senior witch.

“Sorry, I’m just-“She heaved out a heavy sigh, “ My mind feels a bit scrambled. I haven’t really gone through so many memories like this, especially ones that aren’t the right ones.”

“What do you mean?” Gone was the irritation, only curiosity and concern lingered in Sammy’s tone.

“Someone or _something_ was with me when I was looking through his dreams.” Abigail elaborated, looking up at Sammy with disturbed eyes, “I don’t know what it is exactly, but it messed with his head. Messed up the memories so much that even I couldn’t tell which one is real, and which one is false.”

“So, what? Henry is a nutcase now?” Sammy rose a brow.

“There is that chance, yes but I don’t believe that’s the case.” Abigail shook her head, “There’s too little information that I’m not sure if they’re real or not, but we can definitely conclude that we aren’t dealing with our ordinary type of blood magic. Whatever it is, it’s dangerous and needs to be put down immediately.“

Sammy chewed on his lips, “Why do I get the gut feeling that this whole mess is a lot more complex than it should be?”

“Maybe we should listen to that,” Abigail mused, “You’re often right about those kinds of feelings anyway. You were always more in tune with the music anyway. No pun intended.”

“Yeah well in this case, the feeling isn’t exactly a good sign.” Sammy pointed out. “Take a rest first before you go tellin’ the High Witch about this troublesome sign.”

“Thanks. Yeah. I think I’ll do that.” Abigail nodded, climbing into the spare bed and within a few seconds, she was out like a light.

After taking a few short moments to rest, Sammy retrieved a new bundle of ropes to hold Henry down with and made sure that the new bindings were tight enough for Henry to not slip his limbs through.

By the time Sammy had finally ensured that no, Henry wasn’t going to wake up screaming again and break through the rope, he collapsed against the chair next to his bed and sighed loudly.

He should’ve thrown the middle finger at the High Witch and walked away while he could, but now he was involved in some mess that didn’t make sense, involved blood and Henry speaking gibberish in his ear.

Who the hell was the Liar anyway?

Sammy groaned to himself again, rubbing his fingers over his face. He was too tired to deal with this mess.

**Author's Note:**

> **"You're going to be just fine, Henry."**


End file.
